I think the concensus is that when you land and get knocked out, you're unconscious for many, many hours in which time everyone is eaten. Or at least most of them, as I got a message many hours in to the game in my cyclops saying there was only one left.

The way I understood it, a lot of lifepods look like they were destroyed from the inside out. So the way that would happen is warpers and it makes sense as they're supposed to hunt down things to stop the spread of the Kharaa.
So when you get knocked out, either due to you being unconscious they don't detect you, or because you haven't left the lifepod you weren't exposed to the virus and the warpers left you alone when they came to investigate

No one dictates what fits. If you want to be pedantic you could say the game does, or more accurately the enemy team.
Let's take Pharah, pharah is a good hero, high damage, high mobility. If someone is a pharah one trick, no one would know as she generally fits. But if your other dps is say a flanker. You don't have much of a front line, and the enemy team might be able to push straight through your shields. The damage dealers are behind them or above them, so they can push forward easier as long as they're careful not to get picked. Now add a hitscan to the enemy team and pharah is going to be the opposite of useful. Sure, she can focus down the one hero countering her and maybe win half the time, but at that point she'd be better to switch up so the enemies don't have something that's working for them. No one has dictated who the pharah plays in that situation other than the pharah herself. And no one has "decided" she doesn't fit, even if she normally does great, in this scenario she's doing poorly. A series of dominoes fell, and the last one happened to fall on top of her.

You could argue that the team should be pocketing the pharah so she can get more kills, but then the other dps is lacking support and you've just shifted which team member is underperforming.
You could argue the other dps should switch and let you be the flanker/distracter, but they could argue the same about you.
You could say it's the teams fault for not working with the pharah, but the team might think it's the pharahs fault for not working with them.
It's all an amalgamation of variables and uncertainty that grows cloudier the less communication there is.

Me and my friend (The zen) came up with this idea and managed to pull it off first try!(of that day) if it isn't clear what I'm looking at near the end. It's this zenyatta spray.

In case you're not familier, while that hand symbol can mean "Okay" in boy scouts and a lot of middle schools, if you can trick a friend into looking at it below your waist you got to punch them (or it meant they're gay, depending on where you're from)

On some of the mobile apps for Reddit. With videos like these. Until you hit the volume button (Regardless of up or down, and even if you already have it set loud) no sound will play. You kinda have to assume there is sound and then signal you want it

The whole reason I did this was to make it my ringtone. Now if anyone else wants a ringtone that's sure to confuse everyone around them and possibly impress their friends, they can do just that. Alternatively, they could already do so, but at least they have more options

Character design has a big part to play for me.
If it's a first person single player game, I usually couldn't care less how I look, especially if I'll be covered in some sort of armor.
If I'm playing with friends I try to make the character look like me, or like a character (established or no) that I could pretend to be during the play through.

I play female characters in WoW because I hate the designs of the males. They all seem bland or overly bulky muscle beasts.
In dark souls I go either way, depending on what story I'm trying to tell for my character or what look I'm going for.
I will say that as I've gotten older I've started playing female characters more and more, and as recent probably more than male ones.